The Horrors Chen Guangcheng Leaves Behind

While blind Chinese dissident lawyer Chen Guangcheng and his family are reportedly free to leave China, millions of Chinese women are left behind to deal with the horrors of forced abortion and sterilization.

The diplomatic tempest between the United States and China that surrounded Guangcheng’s escape from house arrest — including the ineptitude displayed by the Obama administration in facilitating his release from China — has been well documented.

However, lost in the diplomatic uproar has been little detailed discussion of the actual issue that caused Guangcheng’s imprisonment in the first place: namely, his opposition to the Chinese government subjugating women to undergo forced abortions and sterilization in adherence to the country’s “one-child policy.”

Adopted in 1978 to curb China’s huge population growth, the one-child policy limits Chinese families to one child per couple. While the policy was initially proclaimed by the Chinese government to last only a generation, it has morphed into a permanent campaign of institutionalized violence against women and girls.

In addition to forced abortions and sterilization, that violence includes violators of the one-child policy — including whole families– sentenced to prison, forced labor camps, beatings, home arrest, severe fines, and loss of jobs.

Those abuses have been highlighted extensively by the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, a commission created by Congress to monitor human rights in China.

In its recent annual report, the congressional commission noted Chinese “official campaigns, as well as numerous individual cases in which officials used violent methods to coerce citizens to undergo sterilizations or abortions or pay heavy fines for having ‘out-of-plan’ children.”

For its part, the Chinese government has steadfastly denied that it is forcing women to submit to abortions and sterilization given that both activities are illegal under Chinese Law. However, detractors say those laws are often ignored by government officials whose promotions are tied with keeping birthrates low in adherence to the one child policy

Guangcheng shed light on that point in 2005 when he organized a class-action lawsuit against Chinese family planning officials in Shandong Provincefor forcing at least 7,000 women to undergo sterilization or late-term abortions in an effort to meet birth rate quotas mandated by the one-child policy.

For his efforts, Guangcheng was sentenced in 2006 to 51 months in prison before being released in 2010 and held under house arrest at his family’s farmhouse in Shandong Province, from where he recently escaped to find sanctuary at the American embassy in Beijing.

Yet, while the Chinese government may be upset over Guangcheng’s efforts to shine light on the seamier side of the one-child policy, it is quite happy to discuss the overall effects of the policy, which it considers to be a rousing success.

Specifically, despite today having the largest population on earth with more than 1.34 billion people, according to China’s National Population and Family Planning Commission, the one-child policy has been able to prevent more than 400 million births in China.

Frank Crimi is a San Diego-based writer and author of the book Raining Frogs and Heart Attacks. You can read more of Frank's work at his blog,www.politicallyunbalanced.com.

StephenD

Not to worry. Hillary, speaking for Obama will tell the Chinese in no uncertain terms that “we in the US hold dear Human rights and we will always be on the side of, blah, blah, blah. Now then, where do we sign to get more money from you?”

Steve Chavez

BOY IS CHEN GOING TO BE SURPRISED! He's leaving a Communist gulag to only be INDOCTRINATED INTO COMMUNISM at whatever university he attends.

Chen though has lived it but the Marxist professors, and all their naive and gullible dupes who wear Che T-shirts, only visit a workers paradise like Cuba, and can't wait to get home and give speeches, as experts, on how wonderful their two week visit was.

"Hey you trick me. I get on plane and you fly over China for hours and then land in China. Yes, I blind but not fool. American preaching communism in America? I no dupe!"

Jimi Belton

This whole world is messed up….Surely The Lord Jesus Christ, is near, even at the door, to open and return to this sin sick world of lost souls, and usher in His Kingdom…..Even So come quickly Lord Jesus

Ghostwriter

Looks like President Obama just gave another club for his enemies to beat him up with. And this one,he did all by himself.

Amused

AND THAT'S NOT THE WORST OF IT :
South Korea has seized thousands of smuggled drug capsules filled with powdered flesh from dead babies, which some people believe can cure disease, officials said Monday.The capsules were made in northeastern China from babies whose bodies were chopped into small pieces and dried on stoves before being turned into powder, the Korea Customs Service said.Customs officials refused to say where the dead babies came from or who made the capsules, citing possible diplomatic friction with Beijing. Chinese officials ordered an investigation into the production of drugs made from dead fetuses or newborns last year.The customs office has discovered 35 smuggling attempts since August of about 17,450 capsules disguised as stamina boosters, and some people believe them to be a panacea for disease, the customs service said in a statement. The capsules of human flesh, however, contained bacteria and other harmful ingredients.The smugglers told customs officials they believed the capsules were ordinary stamina boosters and did not know the ingredients or manufacturing process.

Amused

.Ethnic Koreans from northeastern China who now live in South Korea were intending to use the capsules themselves or share them with other Korean-Chinese, a customs official said. They were carried in luggage or sent by international mail.The capsules were all confiscated but no one has been punished because the amount was deemed small and they weren't intended for sale, said the customs official, who requested anonymity, citing department rules.China's State Food and Drug Administration and its Health Ministry did not immediately respond to questions faxed to them Monday. Chinese media identify northeastern China as the source of such products, especially Jilin province which abuts North Korea.
The Jilin food and drug safety agency is responsible for investigating the trade of such remains there. Calls to the agency and to the information office of Jilin's Communist Party were not answered Monday.
The South Korean customs agency began investigating after receiving a tip a year ago. No sicknesses have been reported from ingesting the capsules.

Ghostwriter

If all of this is true,and it seems too incredible to believe,why would they do this? It's beyond sickening. It's depravity at a level I can't even begin to understand nor want to.

WilliamJamesWard

So Molech turns up in China, what this portends is as vile as the cannibalism going on
in the N. Korean slave labor camps. The problem with war is it ends to soon, the evil
is not wiped off of the face of the Earth hence no final war, I will hold out for just that
and the destruction of evil………………………William

Amused

Still wanna buy ANYTHING from China ????

WilliamJamesWard

I am tossing out all of my Chineese green tea, you never know………………….William

Amused

It's true Ghostwriter ,the chinese are strange people .

Goemon

And in some parts of Africa they think baby-r*p* cures AIDS. What’s with these sick people thinking this nonsense about babies?

WilliamJamesWard

All in all what is this kerfuffle all about, really, this or something like this is always coming up
when American Officials visit to do business. I think it is a convenient dodge to take attention
off of what is going on and what is going on is never really disclosed, my guess is just another
selling out of America in one form or another…………………………….William